In the field of dentistry, particularly in the field of dental technology, when making a dental prosthesis such as a dental restorative material and a denture base, a method is widely employed of forming a shape of the dental prosthesis with a before-curing light curing material and fixing the shape by irradiating light to harden the light curing material. Herein, an apparatus which irradiates light to cure (polymerize) the light curing material is the polymerization apparatus for dental technology.
Conventionally, a fluorescent lamp, halogen lamp, xenon lamp, and the like have been used as a light source of a polymerization apparatus for dental technology. However, these light sources do not necessarily have long life; thus it is necessary to change the light sources quite frequently. Further, many of the commercially available light curing materials for dental purposes can be cured (polymerized) with a blue or purple light having a short wavelength. However, the above described light sources emit a light with a wide wavelength range, thus including a wavelength outside the wavelength range necessary to cure the light curing material. As such, these light sources use energy in excess in the unnecessary wavelength range; thus effective irradiation of light cannot be expected.
On the other hand, Patent Documents 1, 2 disclose a polymerization apparatus for dental technology using a light-emitting diode (LED), wherein a plurality of light-emitting diodes which emit a light with a specific wavelength range, thereby enabling more effective irradiation of light than before.